Gary Direnfeld

They happened to be East Indian.

They included some respected elders in this meeting, which I didn't understand in the moment at the time.

But I did catch on and realized that that was actually a very respectful thing that they were doing.

The elders were there to make sure that we, the parents...

manage respectfully between ourselves.

So anyways, one of the elders introduces the concept that we have to plan this wedding.

I quickly jumped in.

Some people would argue this with me, but I'm less into power and control, at least with my own family.

My wife and I had agreed on a strategy, if you will, for this meeting.

And so I jumped in and I said, look, we actually don't care what the kids do.

We have a particular pot of gold amount of money that we're able to contribute to their wedding.

And we told them what it was.

This is the amount of money.

This is our budget.

This is all in everything.

Well, we've had friends say that, you know, those who hold the gold hold the power.

And, you know, that's not my thing.

So I said, this is the pot of gold.

We have but one request.

And there was silence.